Before this chapter starts, I want to thank someone who left a review with some helpful criticism. I appreciate the suggestions and will try to work on them. And to answer some questions, when I said that no one was at Kirito's Floor, I meant that no one was at a decent level to go that high.
This chapter is starting out retelling what happened after the Skull Reaper boss fight.
We all rested after the boss fight, drinking HP potions to recover. The fight had been costly, and all the survivors were spent. I looked around at them all, knowing that many of them had lost friends while fighting. My eyes wandered to Heathcliff, then to his HP. It seemed to be just one point away from yellow, but from the damage he had taken he should have been almost red. How can that be? I wondered. I thought back to our duel, when time had suddenly stopped as I was about to hit him and win. I had stopped, but he kept moving.
My thought were interrupted by the gate to the next floor opening. We all looked to see who was opening it. Klein, of course, appeared to have gotten impatient. "Can you blame me? We've literally been sitting on our asses for fifteen minutes!"
Heathcliff sighed. "Klein is right. We shouldn't waste any more time. On to Floor 76!" Everyone started to go up the stairs and into the new Floor.
Asuna squeezed my hand. "We're one step closer to going home."
I smiled. "Yeah. Fifteen to go." We made our way up the stairs. The new Floor was devoid of any player civilizations, as expected, but was filled with castles, mountains, and villages. The spire leading to the next Floor was on the far side.
Heathcliff scouted the scene from the cliff edge. "It appears that the nearest village is a day's journey. We'll travel till nightfall then set up camp. Hopefully we'll arrive by noon tomorrow." He started leading the march.
We travelled through the rest of the day without incident. No mobs attacked, no traps were activated, no jackasses triggered any quests, nothing. Heathcliff even commented that if we got up as the sun was rising we could make it to the village while it was still morning. This Floor was too safe to be taken lightly, in my opinion. We set up camp at sunset, ate supper, and immediately went to sleep.
We set out again first thing in the morning. Sure enough, we arrived at the village well before noon and found the NPCs only just spawning in. Excited, everyone split up to explore the town. I walked with Asuna and Agil, looking around at the different shops and seeing if there was anything we really needed. Since my custom Blackwyrm Coat leveled up with me, as did my Dark Repulsor, I didn't find any armor I needed, and my Elucidator was still better than anything I saw.
Asuna, though, practically spent everything we had taken with us. Any jewelry or clothes that caught her eye were almost instantly in her inventory. Agil bought a few things he thought he could pawn off to some players lower down when he got back to his shop. Other than that we just looked around the town.
More players started arriving a few hours later and the town quickly filled up. After we felt like it was too much, we rounded up Klein's gang and headed off for the next town. This proved much more dangerous.
The path led into a dense forest, and the howls and roars that came from within told us that things had already started spawning. We stood outside for a little bit, wondering if we should really go, just the seven of us, on Floor 76. "Well, now or never!" Klein grinned and started to walk in. We followed.
The mobs weren't as difficult as we had anticipated, and we came into a completely empty clearing near the other edge within an hour. It had no clear path once we entered, which didn't make sense. Why would there be a path that just ended? Unless...
Suddenly leaves started swirling in the center of the clearing. A figure in a green cloak faded into view where the leaves were twirling. The leaves settled and an HP bar appeared. It read The Arborian Hermit. A twig sprouted from under its hood, which it broke off and started spinning. It stopped and a blade broke free of the wood on both sides. We all drew our weapons and prepared for the mini-boss's attack.
It hurled the spear at us, but I immediately cut in down the middle, shattering it into data. Agil and Klein ran at it, but just before it could throw a barrage of sharpened leaves, they jumped out of the way and Asuna used her signature Sword Skill to interrupt it. It was thrown back by her flurry of stabs,then I ran in and slashed an X through it. That one combo had dealt a lot of damage, but it was still green. The leaves started swirling again, then they flew at us. We weren't able to dodge, taking damage equal to exactly half of what we had. Wierd, it did different amounts for all of us. Is that attack suppose to always do half? If so then we're doomed if we get hit by that again.
It started to prepare that attack again, but I was ready and pulled out three throwing spikes. I charged a throwing Sword Skill and threw them, hitting it dead on. The leaves flew out prematurely, doing no damage, and the Hermit's HP sank into the yellow. It growled and tore its cloak off, revealing a grotesque bear-man. Its name changed to The Arborian Beast. It ran at us, slashing its claws. We managed to dodge, but it spun and hit Agil as he was coming to a stop. He was thrown across the clearing and collapsed, his HP hitting red. I gritted my teeth and ran at the monster. I charged a Nightmare Rain into my swords and slashed at it. It was stunned by the first hit and was completely helpless for the rest of the combo. X-slash, double left strokes, one behind upward slash. The last strike threw it backward and brought its HP just barely into the red.
I was about to finish it with a Starburst Stream, but suddenly two cleavers flew through the air and sank into its head. Its HP dropped to zero and it shattered, dropping the cleavers. We all recieved equal XP and gold, but no drops. A cloaked man dropped from the trees and retrieved his cleavers, then several others followed. "Thank you for weakening the boss and yourselves for us." He turned and showed us the back of his hand, baring the Laughing Coffin insignia. "Now, I hope you don't mind if we finish you all off."
One of his men stepped forward. "Hand on a minute, PoH." The leader turned to him. "I haven't killed in a while, so do you think I could get first dibs?"
PoH was silent for a second, then laughed. "You're a keeper! Go right on ahead..." he checked his name on his party. "...Oblivion. It's show time!" Hang on, what?
"Thank you, sir." He drew his swords, charged a red sword skill, then...vanished. Everyone scanned the area, then suddenly red damage marks started appearing. On the Laughing Coffin members. They all tried in vain to heal themselves, but one by one they shattered. He reappeared just as PoH's HP dipped onto red. "Sorry, but I prefer justice to murder." PoH laughed and used a Teleport Crystal to escape. "Oblivion" turned to me. "Sorry for the scare there. Just needed them to let their guard down. Here." A trade GUI appeared in front of me. "That's everything I got from the boss and those jackasses. Use it however you want, Kirito." He pulled off his Laughing Coffin gloves and dropped them before leaving through the pathway that opened when the boss died.
Agil limped back over to us. "Damn, what was that about? Do you know that guy?"
I looked at his name in the GUI. "Maybe." I accepted the gold and items and we got to work healing ourselves before continuing on.
We got out of the forest ten minutes later and made our way down a cobble road to the next town. Since it had gotten late, we checked into an NPC inn and most of us went to bed. I, however, couldn't sleep. I stayed sitting up in bed, thinking about the guy who saved us. Could it be the same Oblivion? Since he was dressed in a Laughing Coffin uniform, I couldn't get anything from his appearance, but his voice was definately similar, if not the same.
"Are you alright, Kirito?" I turned to see that Asuna was still awake.
"Yeah, just...I can't shake the feeling that I know that guy." She knew who I meant. "I had an IRL friend around my level in the Beta who called himself Oblivion, but it's possible that he didn't get the game, or he didn't log in in time, or he chose another name and this guy got to be Oblivion." I sighed and put a hand on my aching head. "If it is him, then we could have another Beater, but if not he could be an ally."
Asuna made me lie down. "Knowing Argo, she'll be up here as soon as we open the Teleport Gate. We could ask her if she knows anything." With that positive thinking I was able to fall asleep.
Just as Asuna said, Argo was the first person to teleport in. I asked her about Oblivion, and she completely fanned out. "You saw Oblivion?! He's the Dark Crusaders' Guild leader!" Ahe calmed herself. "They're the number two Guild, surpassed only by you Knights of the Blood Oath. Apparently their the only front lines good-guy Guild with mostly red players." I knew about the DC. A few of their members were with us when we went up against the Skull Reaper.
"Thanks, Argo. Anything else about Oblivion?"
"Yeah. Apparently he dual-wields like you most of the time, but only because he's cheating the system and equiping it in place of a shield. He doesn't have any Sword Skills for it." Not helpful in identifying him, but otherwise useful. "His Guild set up shop on floor 72 if you want to talk to him, one Beater to another. He wasn't subtle on that fact."
"Thanks again." Asuna and I immediately left for Floor 72.